Page:Swedenborg's Doctrine of Correspondence.djvu/149

Rh, to acknowledge them, to make ourselves guilty, and to condemn ourselves on account of them. This, when it is done before God, is the confession of sins.

"To do the work of repentance, is to desist from sins after a man has thus confessed them, and from an humble heart has made supplication for remission, and to live a new life according to the precepts of charity and faith. He who only acknowledges generally that he is a sinner, and makes himself guilty of all evils, and yet does not explore himself, that is, see his own evils, makes confession indeed, but not the confession of repentance; he, forasmuch as he does not know his own evils, lives afterwards as he did before. He who lives the life of charity and faith does the work of repentance daily; he reflects upon the evils which are with him, he acknowledges them, he guards against them, he supplicates the Lord for help. For man of himself continually lapses towards evil, but he is continually raised by the Lord, and led to good. Such is the state of those who are in good; but they who are in evil lapse continually, and are also continually elevated by the Lord, but are only withdrawn from falling into the most grievous evils, to which of